The present invention is concerned with a process for making short pile fabrics, the process entailing a specific method of coloration of the fabric in order to achieve flexiblity in manufacturing different colors of fabric and in order to achieve a unique appearance, and in order to utilize undyeable fibers, such as homopolymer acrylic fibers.
Although applicant is not aware of any closely related published prior art, applicant is aware of some of the common practices in the manufacture of short pile fabrics. It is believed by applicant that in all prior art processes involving the manufacture of finished short pile fabrics by dyeing the backing material, the manufacturer attempted to color match the color of the backing to the color of the face fiber. In the instance in which the pile fiber was precolored and of differing eye affinity from the backing to which it was combined, manufacturers strive to dye the backing to the same color as that of the face fiber. Any resulting differences between the backing color and the face fiber color were believed to cause a "grinning through" of the backing, an undesirable effect. Although the manufacturers never perfectly match the backing color to the color of the face fiber, Table IV includes data to show how well the color matching process has succeeded in the prior art, as opposed to a lack of color matching, which is the subject of the present invention. Prior to the conception of the present invention, a lack of color matching was considered detrimental because it was considered to be a source of grinning through. This belief has been found to be true in the instance in which the face fiber is opaque, but it has unexpectedly been found that the use of a transparent face fiber does not require the matching of the color of the face fiber with the color of the backing material.